The Irregulars
by Decisions Are Hard
Summary: Normal life is over for John Watson. It ended when he was shot in the shoulder and somehow got superpowers. Now an Irregular under the "Protection" of the "British Government" he hunts down trouble-making Irregulars that have gone power mad all while trying to keep up with his flat mate and fellow Irregular Sherlock Holmes.
1. Chapter 1

_I do not own this show at all. Expect updates of this fic on Wednesday if i miss it one week check it out the next and it should be up. Any planned hiatus lasting for longer than two weeks will be posted both in the story and in the profile, unplanned emergency hiatus's will only be posted on the profile. Now that that is out of the way please enjoy the story.  
><em>

"You're trying too hard." Dr. Ella said softly as she looked at John Watson. "It will take you some time to come to grips with what happened to you. It's natural for you to feel frustrated, to feel like you're not going to get through this anytime soon. It's natural to feel like you need to get it immediately or you'll never be able to, but this is going to take time and patience."

"I would feel better about not having any control of it if I wasn't being held prisoner here." John said bitterly the words burning with fake civility. He clenched his fists tightening them around the steel cane that sat on his lap. His hand trembled minutely even as he tightened his grip.

"This isn't a prison John we are not locking you up because you've done something wrong. The Irregular House is a safe house. It is a place for Irregulars to learn to control their gifts in a comfortable and secure environment without the fear of accidentally hurting someone. Until you have control of your gift you are a danger to yourself and to others. For your own protection and the protection of everyone around you we're holding you here until you can enter society safely. Answer this question for me and tell me if you are ready to rejoin society. An Irregular of your strength with no control of their gift loses control of it on the tube, what happens?"

John didn't answer he glared at her with anger simmering in his chest. His knuckles turned white as he squeezed the cane and tried to reign in the sickening feeling in his chest that was letting him know he was close to losing the tenuous control he had over it.

"Dr. Watson answer me." She stated simply like she wasn't demanding him to rip open the most sensitive part of himself and put it on display.

"Everyone dies." He ground out through gritted teeth.

"And do you have enough control to prevent that?"

"No." He said reluctantly.

Dr. Ella leaned toward him her hands clasped together on her crossed legs. "I'm going to ask you a question Dr. Watson and I want you to answer it truthfully. Whatever you say next will influence my decisions from here on out. I want to help you, but I can only help if you answer with the truth. So do not lie to me here to save face or to spare my feelings. Are we clear?"

"I'll do my best." He said the caustic bitterness having dissipated some a sinking feeling in his chest he identified as hopelessness rising up in its place.

"Do you feel that these sessions with me are helping you gain control of your gift?" Dr. Ella said the same way she seemed to say everything, with a mix of pity and compassion that ignited a virulent flame in John Watson like almost nothing else could. He was a fully grown mature man. He was a doctor and a soldier. He did not want nor did he need to be coddled.

He sat there silent for a moment weighing his answer carefully. "No Dr. Ella I do not feel like these sessions are helping me."

She nodded decisively like she agreed with what he said. "Most Irregulars respond well to therapy, but everyone is different and things that work well for one person won't work for others. That is why I am recommending that you be removed from therapy and placed in a Mentorship Program. If you chose to join the program you will be partnered with an experienced Irregular who can stop you if they feel you are losing control. They will be your Mentor. You will live with them in a flat overseen by a Manager, that is to say a normal person like me that will help you to gain control of your gift. The Manager is not a therapist and you are not required to speak with them about your thoughts or feelings. If you for whatever reason cannot go someplace with your Mentor you must stay near your Manager. Specialized bracelets will prevent you from going more than one hundred yards from your Mentor or Manager outside the flat. You will be required to live with them and work with them. Wherever they go you will go. Whatever their plans are your plans are. Whatever missions they have are your missions. Once they feel as though you are thoroughly in control the security bracelet will be removed and you will no longer have to rely on your Mentor or Manager to leave the flat."

"I won't have to come to anymore sessions?" John asked sounding thoughtful to the therapist's well hidden delight.

Dr. Ella shook her head. "No once you are signed up for Mentorship any and all therapy sessions end. Instead your Manager and Mentor will oversee your progress. The only way you will return to therapy is if you choose to do so or your control of your gift deteriorates."

"I'll be able to go outside then." John said and the therapist noticed that his hands had loosened their grip on his cane and he leaned forward.

"As long as either your Mentor or Manager goes with you, yes you'll be able to leave your apartment whenever you need to do so." Dr. Ella said with a nod. "So would you like to join the Mentorship Program or would you like to proceed with therapy."

John sighed weighing each option carefully even though he already knew how he would answer. He nodded once confident with what he decided and spoke. "Sign me up for the program."

Dr. Ella picked a thin manila file folder up from the table beside her and held it out to him. "Pack your bags and be ready to leave at six thirty sharp. A black car will pick you up at the front gate and drive you to your new flat. In the car you will be given your instructions, your new security and bank cards, your security bracelet, and a packet of rules and restrictions."  
>He took it from her and resisted the urge to look through it. "Thank you Dr. Ella."<p>

"You're welcome Dr. Watson. I wish you the best." She said as she stood and held out her hand for him to shake. He shook her hand feeling lighter than he had since he'd been invalidated home.


	2. Chapter 2

_I do not own this show at all. Now that that is out of the way please enjoy the story._

**Afghani Desert 16 Months Ago**

Captain John Watson was enjoying some of his rare down time sitting in the back of the convoy. Brandon was telling the story about his ex-wife's meltdown again and somehow even after hearing it thirteen times it still made most of the men break down in hysterical laughter. He smiled along with the story even as he wrote in his journal. There was nothing he needed to take care of at the moment and he was content to just relax and write about whatever happened to cross his mind at the time. His moment of peace was shattered by a boom as the Humvee in the front of the caravan exploded sending shrapnel and danger flying. The rest of the caravan stopped as chaos erupted. Terrorists shot at the soldiers and the soldiers returned fire. Men fell and didn't get back up, bullets rained down from all sides, and fire burned from the remains of the Humvee.

John Watson kept a calm head in the chaos even as he ran from behind cover to retrieve bodies the one's that belonged to the living his main priority. His Browning was getting a workout as he worked to defend himself and others the only way he could with his gun and his med kit. He worked on his patients on the ground behind a Humvee as shelter. Things took a turn for the worst when Brandon fell and tried to get up and John ran out to retrieve him. He was holding up his fellow soldier when a bullet ripped through Brandon's leg and his own felling them like trees. Another shot rang out this time cutting through John's shoulder and the desert erupted in fire.

John screamed as his insides bubbled as what could only be described as heat, intense burning scalding, heat poured out of his pores and tore into the desert. Men died instantly as they were consumed by the heat John desperately tried and failed to control. What almost looked like solar flares in miniature danced off his body like lightning bolts. His body was energy and fire that glowed like the sun in midday and burned like smelters fire. It lasted hours, days, months, years, centuries, until it felt like endless agony. Then slowly so slowly it felt like time was crawling to a stop the flares ceased and his body dimmed until he looked the same as he had before the event. He fell unconscious in the middle of blackened glass, a scar, a crater, that was branded into the desert.

Hours later British Agents scoured the desert in search of the lost caravan. What they found was a scene from a post-apocalyptic nightmare. There was nothing but black glass and desolation for a kilometer on each side of the event. Nonetheless they put on protective clothing and began to comb the area. There were no bodies, no vehicles, as far as they could see there was nothing there. It was an hour after the search began when a sign of hope was found.

"We've got a survivor!" Agent Adams yelled from the center of what could only be called the event.

"What happened here?" Agent Greenfield said under his breath as he looked at the destruction.

"This is glass, the ground here it's all glass. Agent Greenfield I think we've got one." Agent Adams shouted sounding excited.

"Is it one of ours?" Agent Greenfield asked his deep voice reverberating through the air.

"He is Captain John Watson M.D. Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers British Army. His tags and uniform just barely survived but everything around him, even the ground it's devastated. There's nothing left, nothing but him and he looks to be the epicenter of the event." Agent Adams said as she kneelt next to the unconscious man.

"An Irregular then. Did anyone else see it? An Irregular like this would be devastating if he ended up in the wrong hands." Agent Greenfield asked his partner.

"No I don't think anything in the area even survived much less witnessed this." She said gesturing at the ground.

He nodded. "May be better this way with no one to pay off to keep silent he'll be easier to hide."

Agent Adam's eyes narrowed under her sunglasses. "Sir these men fought and died here, they deserve some respect."

"You're right. I'll get the technical team to list the names of everyone in the convoy and send word to their families. No bodies were found so we'll list them as missing in action. You see to it that Captain Watson is transported back home and get ahold of the Irregular House and they'll want this one." Agent Greenfield said with a tilt of his head to the side.

**London Drug Den 5 Years Ago**

The den was the same as it ever was crawling with junkies and stinking of unwashed people and waste. What was unusual was that Sherlock Holmes was there and he was burning. The high he craved usually made the world spin and shine, sparkle like glitter and fireworks and make his brain feel less like a runaway train falling apart as it reached speeds it couldn't withstand. It made the chaos in his brain settle down so he could see clearly. It made everything feel so much better even as it ravaged him tearing apart his transport and rotting away his brain. But now he could feel the damage as it clawed at his veins with fire and set his brain collapsing until he felt he was self-destructing. He convulsed on the ground his skin crawling inside out. His blood was boiling over and his bones were shattering. The room was crashing in on him and he screamed as the pain washed over him like waves crashing on the beach ever ebbing and flowing.

The drug den around him began to shake like a tent in a hurricane and those who were still aware enough to sense the danger abandoned the building. The cracks in the walls began to spider web out as the shaking grew more and more intense. The pipes creaked and the windows that still remained shattered. Water spilled out of the walls and the ceiling as the pipes failed under the pressure and everything that wasn't nailed down was tossed away from Sherlock's shaking screaming body. The few remaining druggies ran or limped depending on how close they were to Sherlock the need to survive overpowering their drug induced haze. The building shook on its foundations rattling as Sherlock began to float the debris forming a tornado like shield around him as the walls began to crumble. It felt like hours to the junkie before anyone came.

Mycroft walked through the floating debris pushing aside some of the heavier things with the end of his trusted umbrella. Usually he wouldn't be doing anything as exhausting as leg work, but one of the men he had surveying Sherlock mentioned that his younger brother was there. Mycroft couldn't leave what might be his little brother fate in the hands of a few trigger happy agents so he volunteered to sort out this mess himself and a mess it was. The whole den was in ruins pulled apart by an active Irregular but it seemed the event had calmed since its inception. Instead of tearing apart the surrounding area the attack had turned almost peaceful with debris floating aimlessly through the air. Even the dust was suspended in individual particles in midair that circled ad floated in visible patterns that had nothing to do with wind or gravity. That more than anything said something about the raw strength of the Irregular behind all this. Few could lift more than one object at a time and this was an entire drug dens worth of debris. Mycroft had a sinking suspicion of who it could be, but he held onto hope that his little brother had kicked this nasty habit and had only come on a case.

He made it to the epicenter where a majority of the debris spun lazily in a circle around the floating figure in what once been the corner of a room. The instant he appeared the debris were flung at him one at a time and Mycroft had to duck and dodge and generally look like a fool to avoid getting hit by anything from a decaying armchair to a used syringe. After having to practically throw himself face down on the filthy floor to avoid being crushed by a washing machine Mycroft had had enough. "Sherlock!"

The shout must have worked because everything that was floating fell like a marionette whose strings had just been cut. Even Sherlock dropped to the ground cracking his head on the wood floor with an audible crack. As the dust Mycroft pulled himself up off the floor and picked up his younger brother in shock at just how light he was. He looked at the devastation his little brother had left in his wake and looked down at his little brother. "Sherlock what have you done to yourself?"

**Irregular House Front Gate London Today **

John waited on the kerb for the black car with only one bag, his old army duffle. He didn't have much Harry had sold most of his things while he'd been overseas at his request. He had a bit saved up from his pension and his stay in the Irregular House but he could see now that most of his budget would be going towards a suitable wardrobe. Harry had brought over the clothes she hadn't sold as well but he needed more than three jumpers, four shirts, two jackets, two pairs of jeans, and a pair of shoes that were practically falling apart on his feet. Besides that all he had to his name were his gun that he shouldn't have but he kept anyway, an old laptop of Harrys, his RAMC mug, and the phone Harry gave him with more bells and whistles to it that he knew how to deal with.

He'd looked through the file Dr. Ella gave him and it wasn't much, but he supposed with all he'd be getting later that wouldn't be a problem. A sticky note on it said to hand it to the person in the car and he saw no reason not to. Inside of it were three pictures on of a building he was guessing was his flat. The other two were of an older woman with white hair and a kind face and a young man with dark hair who did not look happy to have his picture taken. He'd turned over each picture in the hopes of finding labels but there were none. A single sheet of paper was also in the file and it was a release form that he'd had to sign and sign it he did. He'd do almost anything at this point to get away from the Irregular House. What they called a safe environment he called claustrophobic.

The car arrived at six twenty nine and he wasted no time getting in. He put his army bag in the trunk and slid into the back seat. He instantly felt out of place in the obviously expensive car with the black leather seats and he sat in silence for a moment before turning to the woman beside him. She looked like she belonged there as she typed away at her phone. John handed the file to her and she took it and looked through it. Seeing the signature she nodded and placed it in a black messenger bag that rested at her feet. She turned to face him. "My name is Anthea and I'll be overseeing your transport, don't worry about losing control around me I'm an Irregular too. I have the ability to create force fields and I can contain you if you begin to show signs of activating your gift."

"Thank you." He smiled and nodded politely though he didn't quite feel like being polite. "Dr. Ella said you would have some things for me."

"Yes I do." She said as she picked the black leather messenger bag up and opened it. She rummaged in it for a second and pulled out a jewelry box that contained a large silver and blue watch that thankfully wasn't feminine. She fiddled with it for a second and held it out to him. "Put this on. This is your security bracelet once you're inside the operating zone it will activate and you will not be able to remove it. It is based on my ability and it will put up a force field around you to protect those around you in the event that you begin to lose control or if you are separated from you Mentor or Manager outside the flat. It will also inject you with a heavy sedative should the force field be activated. It will not prevent you from using your gift all together and as you gain more control the settings shall be adjusted accordingly. If for any reason it is set off an Overseer will be alerted to come and pick you up. Any questions?"

"If you have these watches then why not do this for every Irregular?" John asked as he placed it on his wrist and listened as the machine hummed as it locked. It fit perfectly not too lose and not too tight.

"Budget." Anthea said sounding like a professor explaining a simple subject to the class clown. "Only those who qualify for the Mentorship Program get them because they are expensive to produce and take time to assemble. It would be a waste to use them on anyone who does not need one. Someone like you who shows no signs of improving under therapy with a gift that would be catastrophic when unleashed are the only ones considered."

John squirmed in his seat a bit telling himself that he was just trying to get comfortable. Anthea reached into the messenger bag again and pulled out another file this one considerably larger than the one Dr. Ella had given him. She handed it to him and spoke. "This packet contains your instructions, your security and bank cards, and the rules and regulations you must follow so as not to be expelled from the program. Read them immediately and sign the last page of each document. When you've done that hand the last page of each document to your Manager and they will get the file back to the Irregular House. These must be signed within the week."

John nodded along where it was appropriate. "Is there anything else I'll need to sign?"

She nodded. "Every time the security bracelet is activated the incident will come with paperwork to be filled out. You must fill out the paperwork honestly or you will be expelled from the program. Other than that there will be no further need for signatures unless an incident that does not involve the bracelet occurs. Keep in mind that the public does not know of Irregulars yet and any purposeful attempt to reveal what you can do to those unauthorized to know will result in immediate expulsion from the program." The black car pulled to a stop and Anthea addressed John. "The address is two two one B Baker Street. They know you are coming and they will meet you there. Any further questions you have are to be referred to them. Goodbye."

"Goodbye." John said as he opened the door and picked up the file and his cane. He limped to the trunk and put the file in his army bag. He closed the trunk and held the bag on his right shoulder. He limped to the door with 221B in gold lettering on the front. He lifted up his hand to knock and paused for a second it had finally registered that this was going to be home now. He hit the door with his knuckles as a smile spread across his face. Home he quite liked the sound of that.

_Thanks to everyone who read, reviewed, favorited, and/or followed this story._


	3. Chapter 3

_I do not own this show at all. I fixed a little part in the first chapter it is 100 and not 500 yards. That is way too long a distance for a successful safety feature. Other than that there are no major changes to the story except for the Wednesday updates. This story will not be abandoned it will just change to freestyle updates from now on. Now that that is out of the way please enjoy the story._

John's knuckles hit the sturdy wooden door the all too familiar tingle of an active force field ran through them. He smiled as he realized exactly why they would ever let an Irregular like him live in the city. He'd become very familiar with the feel of force fields during his stay at the Irregular House and it still felt weird to be so reliant on a technology half of him still believed should only exist in science fiction because he was too dangerous to go anywhere without it. He knocked again ignoring the static feeling that clung to his hand and was rewarded with the door swinging open.

"Hello there you must be John. I'm Mrs. Hudson your Manager. Your Mentor Sherlock and I are both very eager to have you here. Come in and I'll show you to your flat dear. They didn't give us much more information than a picture and a name so I would like for you to come over some time so I can get to know you better." The woman from the photograph greeted him. She looked kinder in real life than she had in the photograph and her voice reminded him of a mother bird. She seemed to be the type to fret and fuss over her charges and it was a welcome change from the cold clinical tones he'd heard nonstop ever since his Irregularity had gone active. She led him up the narrow stairs going slow enough that he could keep up with her with little difficulty even with the cane and his army bag slung over his shoulder. He wasn't sure if he should feel insulted or not but decided against it, there was no need to get himself sent back less than a day after being released because he decided to pitch a fit.

She led him into what he suspected was his flat and his jaw nearly hit the floor. His army bag slid from his slack shoulder and landed hard on the floor but he paid it no mind. At the Irregular House he'd seen some impressive displays of power, usually from newcomers and others like him who had trouble keeping their power under control, but nothing like this. Nearly everything in the room was moving through the air and it all flew at different speeds with different patterns. Most of the furniture floated in place bobbing like a buoy in water some of it almost touching the ceiling though none of the larger things moved like the smaller things did zipping through the room like a swarm of bees. The most he'd ever seen an Irregular with that kind of gift move was the couch half an inch away from the wall so they could see the remote to move it. This was an entire room zooming through air with no sign of stopping. He walked further into the room and saw a young man on a green chair with his eyes closed moving his hands in erratic patterns the floating objects responding to the motions. His face moved from expression to expression as his entire body moved through whatever it was he was doing.

"Oh he must be in his mind palace." Mrs. Hudson chirped as she came up beside him a fond smile on her face as she watched the young man. "You go take a seat and I'll bring you a cuppa tea. It's impossible to get through to him when he's in that state but don't you worry about being hit by anything. He's as he once put it unconsciously aware of everything that's going on around him so he won't accidentally stab you with a flying knife or anything. If you have to pull one of the chairs down so you can sit he'll let you. Just don't try and snap him out of it. You might make him drop everything and the last time that happened I lost all my good china. Mr. Watson." She said as she walked out of the room.

"It's Dr. Watson actually." John said as he picked his jaw up off the floor and walked further into the room. Mrs. Hudson was right about him not being hit. Everything moved over or around him when he got too close and some of the schools of smaller items like loose change and paperclips swirled around him before floating away. Nothing got under his foot though he had to keep a strong hold on his cane as the other Irregular seemed unconsciously determined to send it into the air to join the rest of the room. John however managed to make it to the floating red armchair without losing the cane. He looked at the chair skeptically for a moment pondering how to get it down. It turned out he needn't have worried the instant his hand touched it the chair lowered to the floor landing softly on the ground instead of falling like he'd expected it too. A Union Jack pillow whizzed past him and he grabbed it out of the air setting it down to make that chair more comfortable. The pillow stayed where it was but the incessant tugging on his cane continued until John gave up the fight to keep it and let go. It took off spinning like a helicopter blade.

John relaxed into the chair trying to identify the items that whizzed through the room. He thought he saw a skull and a violin but he wasn't sure as it all moved too fast to identify. Mrs. Hudson brought him the cuppa tea he was promised and he watched amused at the way she fearlessly walked through the chaos with no care at all to the things flying at her. He took the cup with a smile though he almost winced at the taste of sugar which he did not take with his tea he drank it gratefully. It was almost a shock when the motion came to a sudden stop and like a school of small fish scattered by a larger fish everything shot to its own place and settled down. Even his cane and army bag settled down on either side of him. The room looked completely different now that it wasn't obscured by flying clutter. It looked to put it frankly like a cross between the cluttered home of an eccentric science professor, the house of a police officer who took their work home with them, and the beginnings of a mad scientist's laboratory. Everything from the bull head with headphones to the human skull on the mantle and full chemist's lab set up in what was supposed to be the kitchen added to the effect.

"So you must be John Watson." The voice that cut into his inspection of the room was deep and smooth filling the room easily.

"Yes and you must be Sherlock Holmes." John turned to find the other Irregular looking at him with cold eyes that looked to be having a disagreement on what color they would like to be seeming to be ice blue one moment and pine green the next. The man looked just as he had in the picture dark hair with his messy curls, pale alabaster skin, well sculpted face, and sharp cheekbones. He was smirking and John smiled back in an attempt to be polite before he spoke again. "I'm assuming that you're my Mentor."

The dark haired man rose from his seat walking toward him with innate grace. He was taller than John and though he wasn't exactly a giant he seemed to tower over everything with just his presence. He stopped in front of John and stretched out his long thin hand for John to shake. "Yes I am."

"So does that happen often?" John asked gesturing around the room trusting that Sherlock would understand what he was talking about.

"Yes. As you can see my gift tends to go off when I visit my mind palace but as it's mostly harmless I don't rein it in." Sherlock said with a pride filled smirk.

"How are you controlling it when you aren't even paying attention?" John asked hoping that this man would be able to help him reach that level of control even as he doubted the possibility of it.

"Practice and I am paying attention I'm always paying attention." Sherlock said as he flopped back the chair behind him moving so the he didn't fall onto the floor. "If you want proof..." The younger man trailed off.  
>"I do." John said with a polite nod.<p>

"Let's start with the obvious then." Sherlock said his eyes flicking over John. "Your haircut and your stance say military. You corrected Mrs. Hudson when she called you Mr. insisting on the title Dr. so an army doctor. There's a tan on your hands and face but no tan above the wrists, no one can get a tan like that in London so you've been abroad. But you haven't been sunbathing or your tan would go further up your arms. Your left hand has an intermittent tremor but there's no residual scaring on your hand and the color is not off so you didn't lose it. You can bend your elbow just fine but your shoulder seems stiff, so a shoulder injury, your left shoulder to be exact. I can't see your leg but the limp is really bad when you walk but when you stand you don't ask for a chair like you've forgotten about it. If the injury was a bullet wound like your shoulder your leg would tremble like your hand, but it only hurts when you move it. I'm guessing your leg was torn apart most likely by a snipers bullet I'm guessing that it shattered the femur. If you were the average soldier I'd say that both the tremble and the leg are psychosomatic, but you're an Irregular. The advanced healing factor that activates whenever our gifts are triggered can't make you forget that you almost died and that you shouldn't have full mobility in your arm or leg. So residual psychosomatic limps and trembles and phantom pain is our brains way of dealing with it." Sherlock said leaning forward in his chair. "So wounded in action then so where could you be wounded in action and get the suntan. It would have to be a warm climate so Afghanistan or Iraq?"

"Afghanistan." John said awe beginning to fill his face.

"Then there's your lack of control you wouldn't be here if you weren't having trouble with controlling it. That's quite telling when all Irregulars have an innate sense of how to control their gifts. For some it takes more time than others to become comfortable with it but very few have much trouble unless the activation of their gift was especially traumatic. Near death experiences are always traumatic, but you you're a soldier you faced death day in and day out without flinching so it's not your death that bothers you. Other people dying however that would bother a man like you, a man who is both a soldier and a doctor. So you must have been wounded in action then and your gift must have reacted violently to your impending death. There would have been no difference between friend and foe to a gift out of control. People you liked people you cared about must have died because you couldn't control it." Sherlock started strong but his voice got softer and more solemn at the end.

John had gone still but he answered. "Yes they did."

Sherlock nodded and when he spoke it was blunt but without the empty condolences most had tried to give him. Instead he spoke like it was fact and it made the bitter pill easier to swallow somehow. "The men who died there went to war knowing that they could pay the ultimate price for their actions and they died soldiers fighting for their country. You couldn't have saved them a gift like yours couldn't have been contained without mastering it first. You need to understand that what happened was more in the vein of a fatal car crash caused by faulty brakes than murder. Even so you can't change what happened and if you do not let that go you are a walking time bomb. I'm not going to lie to you and say it will all go away it won't. It doesn't mean you have to shoulder that guilt constantly, in time you'll heal but only if you quit picking at the wound. It happened and you need to face it because if you don't all that the guilt is going to do is make a repeat of that incident inevitable."

"I know." John nodded as he listened Sherlock hadn't tried to say it wasn't his fault. It was all he'd heard from Dr. Ella and he'd wanted to scream and rage that it was his fault that they would be alive if he hadn't been there. His gift had acted up whenever she tried to make him believe that he had nothing to do with it. Her reflexive force fields and the force fields on the room saved her more times than he could count. But Sherlock didn't try to deny his involvement and that one thing helped more than months of therapy and empty condolences ever had. It said that yes he'd been there and people had died because of him, but he could move on, he could get through this, and he could live again.

Sherlock gave a curt nod. "I am not going to tiptoe around you or walk on eggshells in my own home. I am not going to coddle you Dr. Watson I fully intend to throw you into the deep end and if you can't learn to swim I will leave you to the sharks."

"Then it's a good thing I'm a fast learner." John said, somehow feeling less like the guilt was going to bury him alive even though Sherlock's callousness shouldn't have helped at all. A tension that he hadn't even noticed building seemed to dissipate at his words and he smiled at Sherlock and though it wasn't steady or strong it was real.

Sherlock smiled back with a measure of restraint that fit the fragile situation that developed and John's smile grew in return. There was an ease in the room that hadn't been there before and though neither one of them seemed to know what to do next the stillness wasn't uncomfortable.

"That was impressive. You just looked at me for a second and you knew everything about me." John finally said breaking the silence easily. "

Sherlock seemed frozen. "After everything I just said you find my deductions impressive. That's not what people usually say."

"Then what do people normally say?" John asked finally relaxing some.

"Piss off." Sherlock said his face twisted in disgust before he broke out in an amused smile. John shook his head trying to contain his laughter but was unable to contain his smile. He could defiantly see why most people would react that way to Sherlock.

_Amusing little factoid here spellcheck decided that I spelled callousness wrong (I might have the keys on my computer often do not register that I have clicked on them) and the word it decided I was trying to spell was crapulousness. I just about died.__Thank you's to everyone, who read, reviewed, followed, and/or favorited and a special thank you to Arty Diane whose questions demanded answers that helped to shape this chapter. I'm going to add this now as I found something that can be confusing so I wanted to clear it up. Dr. Ella is an Irregular and she referred to herself as a normal person this is a psychological thing. She wants her patients to think of themselves as normal people still. If an Irrgegular begins to think of themselves as a monster or anything along those lines it is detrimental to their control, accepting their gift is also a big part of controlling it. So a Manager can and most likely will be an Irregular it doesnt mean that they automatically are but it means that they can be. I hope that that clears things up abit.  
><em>


	4. Chapter 4

_I do not own this show at all. Now that that is out of the way please enjoy the story._

"So." John said after they finished laughing. "How are you supposed to help me control my gift? I can't exactly use it with the freedom you use yours it is way too dangerous. I could destroy everything in here." He gestured to the room with his hand.

Sherlock's lips curled in an ironic smile. "And mine isn't?"

"I don't know." John said with a shrug of his shoulders. "I guess it could be."

Sherlock leaned toward him something dangerous seeming to simmer under his skin. "Then let me put it in perspective for you I can move things. I can move lots of things at once with little effort. I do not know the limit of what I can lift only because I have run out of things to test my strength on. When I went active I tore apart an entire building. With my gift I could murder someone and there would be no evidence of my involvement whatsoever. I could drop something heavy on them make it look like an accident or I could stab them without ever touching a knife or I could shoot them without leaving powder burns on my hands or my fingerprints on the gun."

The room was rapidly filling with tension and John was beginning to wonder what kind of man it was that he'd been shacked up with. Sherlock's eyes were narrowed and his voice was dangerously smooth as he spoke though he didn't sound angry. He sounded more like a big cat that had cornered some small defenseless animal. "If I wanted to right now I could make your blood stop moving through your veins, or I could crush your heart, or I could switch the positon of your internal organs. I wouldn't even have to get up from my chair. If I wanted to kill you I could and there's nothing you could do to stop me. Do you think my gift is dangerous now?"

John nodded reluctantly and wet his lips with his tongue, a nervous habit he could never break. "Yeah I see how that could be dangerous."

"Every gift can be dangerous but it doesn't have to be." Sherlock said putting his hands under his chin in a prayer like hold as he crossed his legs. "Even your gift surely has more varied uses than mindless destruction."

"I doubt that my gift is anything but varied. When you went active you might have torn apart a building. But me when I went active I burned and everything, everyone around me they burned too. I was active for less than a minute and when I stopped burning there was nothing left of my convoy, my men, my friends, but blackened glass that used to be sand. Nothing, not even the vehicles survived so how am I supposed to control that?" John said eyes narrowed and nostrils' flaring even as his voice was unaffected, a chilling calm.

Sherlock looked over him with eyes that were piercing in their intensity. His hands were folded in a way that was reminiscent of prayer and he radiated calm in the face of danger. "You've already started." The deep voice cut through the gathering tension like a knife.

"What are you talking about?" John asked his expressive face showcasing his confusion so clearly it was almost humorous.

"Your hand has stopped shaking." Sherlock said gesturing to the other man's hand with a short wave of his hand before taking the prayer position again.

John looked down as his left hand and Sherlock was right it wasn't shaking at all. "And what does that have to do with anything?"

Sherlock smirked and leaned back in his seat practically oozing confidence his hands moving to better express his words. "It has everything to do with it. Psychosomatic injuries are the most accurate indicator of control in Irregulars. An Irregular in control doesn't have any phantom pains caused by the near death experience that activated them whereas an out of control Irregular does. So first things first we get rid of the limp after that your major control issues should sort themselves out."

"And then what we try to burn down the street? My gift isn't what you'd call subtle." John said with a raised brow as he leaned further back in his chair. "I'm sure the neighbors will appreciate having to move away when everything they own is destroyed and that's only if they survive." John finished with a sharp bitter laugh.

The detective looked at John like he was stupid and John had the feeling that that look would be one he would get very familiar with as time passed. "When it activated maybe, but every time you've used it you've been on the defensive." Sherlock stood and began pacing the room. A few small objects including the skull floated out to follow him as he paced making Sherlock look like some bizarre macabre version of a mother duck. "You were afraid, you were dying, you felt threatened and your gift lashed out to eliminate the threat. Without any toxic stimulus your gift should be much tamer. Mine was the same way of course the toxic stimulus I dealt with was my brother Mycroft. You'll meet him soon enough he's our Overseer sadly he'll be the one giving us our missions." Sherlock said turning to face John.

"Missions?" The one word was defiantly a question and one Sherlock didn't hesitate to answer.

"You didn't think we were just going to sit here and do nothing all day did you?" He asked with a raised eyebrow the things that had been following him now hovering around him.

"No but what missions are you talking about Dr. Ella might have mentioned something about taking missions but she didn't go into any detail about it." John said leaning forward in his chair.

Sherlock sighed getting his whole body into it slumping into the seat. His floating pseudo ducklings flying back to where they had been sitting earlier. "As you know right now as far as the masses are concerned Irregulars only exist as fiction in the movies or in the pages of comic books. This kind of information must be released carefully to prevent panic. Right now revealing our existence to the world would be devastating for both the normal population and the Irregulars. So we have to hunt down the unregistered ones. You and I are one of the few teams authorized to go after the Irregulars with dangerous gifts that use them to cause trouble. You wiped out an entire convoy in less than a second. Imagine the damage you could cause if you unleashed that here in the city. Now imagine someone with a gift that powerful and none of your morals. London would fall." Sherlock said his voice darkening.

"And we do what with them when we catch them?" John asked the words seeming to hang in the air for a moment.

"We either contain them to send to a facility prepared to deal with them or we put an end to them. I haven't had to do so yet, my brother prefers to keep me away from the bloodshed." Sherlock said matter of factly.

He looked at John with eyes that looked like they could see his every secret and a strained silence fell over them. John waited for a while before breaking it saying the first thing that came to his mind in an effort to end the tension. "So is Mrs. Hudson an Irregular too Dr. Ella said she would be a regular person like her but she was an Irregular. She said stuff like that a lot trying to make me see myself as normal. It never worked."

"Yes she is." Sherlock said nodding.

"What can she do?" John leaned forward in his chair eager to get carried into a less intense conversation.

"She can make anything she holds in her hands invisible if it's small enough. She's been working to expand it to larger objects. She can make the teapot vanish if she concentrates enough. " Sherlock said and John got the impression that he spoke with his hands a lot from how much he'd moved them. Several things from the room reacted floating in the air or shaking in place depending on how big it was whenever Sherlock moved and John had the thought that perhaps he wasn't the only person in need of training.

"That doesn't sound like it would be of much use." John said a bit skeptically.

"You'd be surprised, she carries an invisible gun and drug dealers would kill to have her Irregularity." Sherlock leaned forward in his chair. "You seem horribly uninformed every Irregular can be dangerous. What did they teach you in the Irregular House?"

"Not much most of my time was devoted to therapy. I'm still not used to all of this." He gestured to himself and the room at large his eyes lingering on the still floating skull. "A world with superpowers wasn't something I was prepared to deal with. So I'm not used to thinking of all the ways people with powers could be dangerous."

"Well then if you're going to go on missions you should at least know the basics. Do you know what the most common type of gift among Irregulars is?" Sherlock asked sounding more like he was being forced at gunpoint to ask the question instead of asking of his own volition.

"Force fields probably. That's the one I saw the most of at the Irregular House at least." John said as he thought back to the Irregular House.

"Yes most Irregulars get the ability to project force fields usually they only extend to cover themselves. Anthea is one of the more powerful of the force field generators, not many of them can make a field that doesn't surround themselves even fewer can hold two fields simultaneously." He took his seat again the skull, it seemed to be his favorite thing to mind carry as John was starting to call it in his head, floating beside him. "Most of the Irregulars we'll go after will have the force field Irregularity. They aren't usually big threats but still a bulletproof thief or murderer will attract attention that we don't need."

"Anything else we need to worry about?" John asked.

The smile on Sherlock's face was strung somewhere between wicked delight and childish joy. "Everything."

_Exposition chapters are annoying but necessary. I love AU's too, alternate universes are so much fun to write and to read. As for any unanswered questions this time they will be dealt with later in the story. Thank yous to everyone, who read, reviewed, followed, and/or favorited. _


	5. Chapter 5

_I do not own this show at all. Now that that is out of the way please enjoy the story._

The next few weeks were strange to say the least but John had a feeling that this onslaught of the strange and macabre would become his new normal. Sherlock to put it simply was the worst flat mate he'd ever had and quite possibly the worst flat mate in all of existence. In the weeks that John had been there he'd found a live octopus in his dresser, a bucket of blood in the bathtub, a foot in the freezer, a bag of a questionable substance that looked like a mix of bread pudding and tar in his sock drawer, and mold that was obviously being encouraged to grow in his closet. It was only a quick explanation of Sherlock's job and the reasons he kept body parts and other unpleasant things around the flat that prevented him from calling the police. The man was apparently a consulting detective and everything he did either had something to do with a case or was used to prevent Sherlock from becoming bored. A talk with Mrs. Hudson had him believing that anything even the mold in his closet was better than a bored Sherlock.

Sherlock's bad roommate skills were not limited to his inability to stop experimenting with cadavers and other unpleasant things. To John it was becoming more and more obvious that Sherlock had a knack for being the most infuriating man on the planet. Nothing was sacred and nothing belonged to him anymore. Sherlock took a very my flat my things approach to anything that belonged to John. His laptop was stolen and Sherlock could hack into it easily no matter how many times he changed the password. Sherlock entered his room while he was sleeping to leave experiments there as evidenced by the octopus he'd found crawling over his pants and the tar pudding in his socks. Nothing was safe not even the fridge, which was filled with random experiments.

As if that wasn't enough to drive a man past the edge of sanity there was the fact that Sherlock's considerable power was just barely under control and that was on a good day. On a bad day John had to dodge flying furniture. More often than not he managed to jar his leg while jumping out of the path of the homicidal furniture. This was made worse by Sherlock saying that he was trying to get John to activate his gift by creating a situation in which he had to defend himself. But John's issues with Sherlock's gift didn't end there. John had been thrown out of bed more than once when Sherlock had a nightmare or decided to wake him up early to go and hunt down the case of the week. Even when Sherlock did not sleep John got no relief because the early morning hours when every sane man was asleep Sherlock liked to play violin. To John it sounded more like he tortured it and in moments of weakness he imagined various ways that he could put the instrument out of its misery.

But he adjusted rather quickly and living with Sherlock kept him on his toes unless his cane was caught up in a mind palace generated whirlwind in which case he usually ended up flat on his arse. His leg had been hurting less and less though which he grudgingly admitted was probably thanks to Sherlock's antics feeding his addiction to danger. He slowly got used to Sherlock's gift, it was hard not to when it caused him so much trouble, and he no longer stopped and stared every time Sherlock sent the room into the air. He learned which days were safe and which weren't by what Sherlock was wearing. A day when Sherlock had his suit on was usually safe, but when John saw that Sherlock was wearing a dressing gown or even just a sheet he knew he had to be ready to dodge the furniture.

Practice was like that in that it usually consisted of dodging whatever Sherlock threw at him and trying to bring out his gift to destroy it before it hit him. He never succeeded as his gift had dimmed greatly since he'd moved into the flat. Now instead of being unable to control his gift because it was so powerful he was barely able to do more than glow like a child's nightlight. His skin would dance with light in shades reminiscent of flames, but he couldn't make so much as a spark. It took about a week of constant practice to do anything more than make a light show. His big breakthrough was heating his leftover takeout dinner without using the microwave (which was possibly contaminated as it was experiment fodder just like everything else in the flat) by accident. It was the first time he started to accept that his gift wasn't just destruction.

A month after moving in he'd mostly adjusted to life with Sherlock and it was that Monday that his life would take another turn for the strange. He was sitting in his chair drinking tea and watching as Sherlock set the room in motion. A man wearing a three piece suit like it was armor and wielding an umbrella with the same kind of care a knight might give his sword walked into the room. He looked official with a clean haircut and there was something about his face that looked familiar but John wasn't able to remember where he had seen those features before. The instant the mystery man stepped into the room everything suddenly froze in midair. It reminded John of some of the movies he'd seen where time stopped or was slowed down for dramatic effect. The man smirked at Sherlock but gave the doctor a congenial smile that did not quite seem to fit on the man's face. "You must be Dr. Watson."

"Hello Mycroft." Sherlock said glaring at the man with the umbrella with disdain his hands clasped under his chin and his face in a perfect mask of disgust. Everything leisurely floating back to where it belonged. "Did you bring us a mission or are you here to check up on me?"

"Hello." John said with a polite smile that he hoped didn't look as forced as it felt. He stopped and blinked as the name rang a bell in his memory. "Mycroft isn't that the name of our overseer."

"Yes it is nice to finally meet you John. I trust you've read the packet." Mycroft said though it sounded so formal John felt that he might have rehearsed it.

"Yes I have, it was very informative." John said thinking back to that dry repetitive stack of paper with more of that forced politeness he hoped looked natural.

"Good." Mycroft said with a curt nod before turning to Sherlock. "We have a mission for you and your Mentee brother." He handed Sherlock a packet that he'd been holding under his arm. "I trust you have been keeping up with what the police are calling serial suicides."

"I have been." Sherlock said holding out his hand for the folder.

Mycroft looked like he was going to roll his eyes but instead he simply handed Sherlock the file. He stood up straightening his jacket as he did so. "We have reasons to believe that these poisonings are the work of an unregistered Irregular. We believe he might have a compulsion or motion ability although my informants are leaning more towards a motion ability."

Sherlock turned to John. "John a compulsion ability is like hypnosis you can't make someone kill themselves if they don't want to die. It would be very unlikely for our killer to possess such a gift in this case a motion ability would be more likely."

"It is nice to see that you are taking your position seriously brother but try to remember there are exceptions to every rule when it involves Irregulars Sherlock. I trust that you will deal with this matter promptly." Mycroft said with a slight incline of his head toward Sherlock.

"We will be right on it." Sherlock said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

"Then I will be on my way. Keep me informed of your progress." Mycroft said before he turned and left the room as suddenly as he had come.

John sighed. "So that was Mycroft?"

"Obviously John." Sherlock said with a sneer. "Hand me my phone I need to contact Lestrade."

_You're right Sherlock can't make a force field but he would be able to pick something up and put it between himself and anything dangerous flying at him. Something fluid like John's fire or something small and fast like a bullet would pose an issue to him. He's got his limits, the only reason he's able to move so much at once in his flat because it's his flat and he knows it well. It would take him time, though admittedly not much time, to use his gift like that in any area he didn't know well without making a total mess, especially if there were people he doesn't know there. As of right now Mycroft has yet to be activated as it takes a near death experience for an Irregular to gain a gift. He only knows about Irregulars because he's in a position to know being the British Government and all. He may yet gain abilities in the future because he has the genetics for it as evidenced by Sherlock but until he has a brush with death he's got nothing but his considerable intellect and his extreme competency at his job. As for the others you'll see as the story progresses what gifts they may or may not have. Thank yous to everyone, who read, reviewed, followed, and/or favorited. _


	6. Chapter 6

_I do not own this show at all. Now that that is out of the way please enjoy the story_.

John rolled his eyes and using his cane for leverage lifted himself out of his chair. He limped over to where Sherlock's phone was sitting on the desk and handed it to the detective angrily. He didn't bother to sit down knowing that they could be running off at any minute and instead watched as Sherlock scowled at his phone his fingers flying over the keys as he sent Lestrade text after text not even bothering to wait to receive one. When he did get a reply he read it with raised brows then flung his phone at John like it burned him. John caught it having gotten good at catching flying objects with the practice sessions Sherlock insisted on and put it in his pocket having gotten used to carrying the detectives things over the last few weeks.

The Consulting Detective glared at him as though he was the one who sent the offending text. John ran his palm down his face beyond frustrated and really in need of a good night's sleep. "What's wrong?"

"It's taking him too long to bring me in." Sherlock said annoyance and boredom coating his voice. "He says that I have to wait until he decides that they need my help."

John sighed before he looked at Sherlock who probably already knew what had gone through his head. "If Mycroft gave you the case the why do you have to go through Lestrade?"

"The case has so far been overseen by the Yard and any attempt to take over would raise suspicion. It would do more harm than good in the long run." Sherlock said waving his hand to wave away John or at least his question.

"In other words we have to wait until Lestrade lets us in." John said watching the other man fidget impatiently as Sherlock drummed his finger on the side of the chair.

"It shouldn't be too much longer. He'll bring us in when the next victim is attacked. It usually doesn't take long for him to crack." Sherlock said as he glared at the phone, as though giving it a dirty look would make it ring.

John looked at the phone. "So Lestrade does he know about you?"

"Yes he was my Mentor." Sherlock said absently.

"He's an Irregular too. So what can he do?" John said trying to keep Sherlock from starting an impromptu training session. He wasn't in the mood to play a rousing game of dodge the skull at the moment.

Sherlock stared down at the phone and put his hands under his chin almost looking like he was praying. "Lestrade controls sound. He's used his _gift_ to silence my violin on more than one occasion." He sneered the word gift like it was an affront to his existence.

"I can't say that I blame him. If I had his gift I'd be tempted to silence your violin too." John said to himself though not quietly enough.

"It disrupted my concentration." Sherlock said crossing his arms as he glared at the doctor. "I was glad when they finally released me from his _care_ and I didn't have him silencing me every time I even touched the bow let alone the violin."

John sighed as he made his way back to the chair and sat down heavily. "I'm sure that was difficult for you, but some people do tend to sleep at night. Noise of any kind can make getting to sleep hard for some people and sometimes when you play your violin it sounds more like cats in heat than music."

Sherlock leaned back in his chair slumping down so much it was surprising that he hadn't fallen out of it. He looked at John with narrowed eyes and a tight smile. "Then I'm sure you won't mind sleeping on the stoop."

* * *

><p>"I thought you never wanted to meet in person Moriarty." Jefferson Hope said as he walked into the unnaturally dark warehouse.<p>

The older man looked around but was unable to see anything but thick shadows except for the one source of light in the room a spotlight that silhouetted a man sitting at a desk in the middle of the room. The cabbie walked to the chair on the other side of the desk and sat down his heart giving a small jump as he sat down and the chair squeaked. The cabbie shivered. Moriarty wasn't a man to mess with and if he ever decided that someone was useless, well that person usually wasn't seen again. He hated to think what would happen to him on the day Moriarty decided he was too much of a risk to keep around.

"Things have changed." The man leaned forward in his chair bright light behind him obscuring his face. "If you want that money I need you to do something for me."

"What would that be?" Jeff said as he tried to shield his eyes from the glare.

"There's a man his name is Sherlock Holmes. For my plans to continue uninterrupted this Sherlock Holmes needs to die." The man said almost lightheartedly causing another shiver to race up his minions spine.

The cabbie blinked hard partially from the revelation that the one person Moriarty had sought after most recently had been added to the body list and partially from the brightness of the light. "The man behind the Science of Deduction website, the one you had me read?"

"Yes. It's a shame I'm quite the fan, but I need him out of the way. I need the British Government compromised and the best way to get to Mycroft Holmes the man behind the curtain is through his brother Sherlock." The man said as though he wasn't really bothered at all.

"I'll see to it then." The cabbie said as he stood to leave.

"I'll have the money wired to your account." Moriarty said and the cabbie could imagine a grin on his face.

"A pleasure doing business with you professor." The older man said with a tip of his pageboy cap to hide how badly he was shaking as he turned and walked out of the warehouse.

Once the cabbie was gone the man in the chair slumped down pressing the heels of his hand to his forehead. The darkness around the room dissolved leaving behind an ordinary looking warehouse filled with pallets, boxes, and forklifts and a man in a suit that didn't look quite right on the man. His blue eyes were dark, squinted against the light, and his blond greying hair was mussed. His features were sharp but twisted in a grimace that highlighted the claw scar from a hunt gone wrong that was almost invisible on his face. "You know I hate pretending to be you Boss, gives me a headache every time."

A small man his dark eyes shining with madness smiled the crack of his lips somehow gruesome on his otherwise handsome face as he walked out of the small office he'd stayed in while his second played his part. He slid into a seat on the desk wiping off imaginary dust from his suit as he did. "A necessary discomfort Sebastian."

"I thought you needed Sherlock alive for your plan? You told me you saw him when we win he's with us." Sebastian looked at his boss skeptically.

"We do and don't worry our friend Jeff won't succeed. This is just a test." He said as he straightened his cuffs.

Sebastian's eyes narrowed as he looked up at his boss. "For who?"

The real Moriarty laughed. "Johnny boy of course. I need to see if he's the doctor we're looking for. Either way Sherlock will survive. The question is will John kill the cabbie to save Sherlock or won't he? If he does then we have our man and if he doesn't, well he might make a good power plant."

_Sorry this took a bit longer to write than I thought it would. In this fic at least that is why Sherlock sticks to testing. Lestrade can silence Sherlock all he wants but he can't do the same to his phone, just in case it's someone important or he's being called into Sherlock picking up an item is mostly unconscious thought he wants it to move and it moves. The kicker here is that he has to have a good idea of what it weighs or depending on how heavy it is it either won't budge or be sent flying. If no one that doesn't already know about his gift is around to see him use it he does use his gift to every advantage. Thank yous to everyone, who read, reviewed, followed, and/or favorited._


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